IN CONVERSATION WITH ASIAN AMERICAN PACIFIC ISLANDER STAFFERS

Manager, Entertainment Marketing

My Trucker features plum blossoms—the Taiwanese national flower—and a mandarin collar. My intention was to weave elements of my parents’ culture, my culture, into a textile with a history rooted in Americana. What’s more American than writing our own stories into the fabric of this country?

My Taiwanese parents immigrated to the U.S. with my sister in 1984. They made a home in the San Gabriel Valley, an area of Southern California where nearly 65% of the population had eyes just like mine and jet-black hair and piles of shoes outside of their front doors. The main street in my small town was lined with Chinese shop signs that I couldn’t read, but that never felt foreign to me. My Asianness wasn’t something I thought about—a privilege I realize doesn’t belong to most Asians growing up in America.

My upbringing afforded me the luxury of being able to dream big and imagine myself in places that I would eventually learn were never meant for me. When I left my hometown, I was suddenly confronted with my Asianness all the time, 

Sr. Designer, Global Brand Creative

In the Philippines, my grandpa served as a scout for the U.S. military during WWII, which earned him a Purple Heart and status as a U.S. Veteran. He was granted U.S. citizenship in 1970, petitioned for his family to migrate to the U.S. and, in 1973, my grandpa and my mom moved to San Francisco and stayed with my auntie, a registered nurse, who already migrated in 1965.

A year after my mom moved to the States, she went back to the Philippines to get married to her high-school sweetheart and one true love, my dad, so she could petition for him to move to the U.S. By 1975, they were both permanent residents, working long hours and multiple jobs to build a life in Daly City, California, which is where they settled to buy a house and raise our family.

Our community in Daly City was largely made up of Asians—it was a big cultural melting pot. Looking back on that now, I’m thankful I was exposed to so many different cultures and family backgrounds. 

Director, Global Brand Styling

Both my parents were born and raised in Japan and came to the West via Canada shortly after they were married. My brother and I were both born in Montréal and then we moved to New Jersey when I was 3. We lived in a predominantly white upper middle class neighborhood. It was idyllic in many ways, but had its underlying issues.

My parents are very curious, adventurous people, which they passed down to me. We traveled a fair bit to other countries as well as in the U.S. I think this may have influenced my obsession with trends and style I’ve had from an early age. I love absorbing the culture, clothing, trends, food, music and experiences from all the countries that I’ve visited in my life.

I get bored easily and like change, so that influences my varying taste. I love expressing my mood through clothing—it’s the ultimate source of self-expression for me. So it felt natural to go into the fashion industry. I knew pretty early on it was what I wanted to do and I’ve never looked back.

District Manager, Northern California

I am fourth-generation Japanese American on my dad’s side and fourth-generation Korean American on my mother’s side. I was born in the Central Valley in Fresno, California. My great grandparents came over from Japan and Korea to make a better life from themselves. My Japanese great grandmother was a picture bride: She was paired with her husband from only a photograph. My Korean great grandparents fled their country to escape Japanese persecution during the occupation.

My grandparents and my parents sacrificed so much so my sister and I could have a better life. My Korean American grandmother, Marilyn Oh, attended three different universities to pursue her college degree. She didn’t have a lot of money, since her grandparents were farm laborers raising four daughters and two sons. My grandparents met in the incarceration camps during the WWII-era imprisonment of the Japanese American community. My grandfather chose to fight for this country and served during the war. My grandmother, Alma Saito, gave birth to my aunt in the camps and raised her alone while my grandfather was overseas fighting.

Garment Developer and Asian ERG Community & Outreach Pillar

I am a proud first-generation, born and raised San Franciscan. Both of my parents were refugees of war; my father came from Vietnam and my mother came from Laos. Both my parents come from well-educated families and can speak 7-9 languages fluently. Due to the Vietnam War in the ’70s, both families left everything they knew in hopes of starting fresh in the “land of possibilities and new beginnings.” Here in the States, my parents were rejected for all the jobs they applied for, despite their university degrees. Both spoke good English but were told their education didn’t mean anything here. When a company my dad applied to ripped his university diploma in an interview, it was a rude awakening and the last straw—my parents knew they had to change something in order to survive. So my father became a chef at a Chinese restaurant and later, a successful businessman. My mother went back to school, got her nursing degree and became a health worker, a job she maintained even when my brother and I came along. 

Director, US PR & Entertainment Marketing

I was born in the Philippines. When I was 7 years old, my parents wanted me to experience school in the United States, so I went to boarding school for my 2nd and 3rd grade. When I was about to move back to Manila, my parents found out my little sister was deaf, so they decided to move to the U.S. to give us better opportunities. They gave up everything they worked hard for. My dad, a successful surgeon in Manila, had to restart his requirements here. I remember the challenges we had with immigration and making sure our papers were in order. It took several years and financial sacrifices to become not only a legal immigrant but a United States citizen. It makes you realize that carrying an American passport is a privilege.

Growing up, I would always see family members wear a gown with these sleeves to weddings or formal events. I always thought it was a bold fashion statement for a Filipina woman. I wanted to incorporate the sleeves into a Trucker Jacket to achieve the same statement and strengthen Filipino pride.

Eureka Apparel Garment Technician

I left Vietnam when the regime changed to the Communist party in 1975. People were scared and wanted to leave—and I was no exception. I wanted to find freedom. In 1987, I was fortunate to get help to escape to Bidong Island in Malaysia. After 3 months, I was transferred to the Philippines to study and do a physical examination. On December 3, 1987 I entered the United States. I felt that it was a very free, democratic place. It was beautiful and grand. It made me feel so free and happy.

I worked a lot of different types of jobs before finding a job at a sewing factory in Chinatown as a sewer. Then in 1996, I saw an ad for a job in the Levi’s^® production department. I went to apply, but I learned that it was an overnight shift. My daughter was still very young at the time, so I didn’t go through with it. But in my heart, I wanted to work here. In 1999, my friend Carmen told me that Levi’s^® was starting a new line called Slate and was looking for a sample maker. I applied, was hired and started working at Levi’s^® on February 8, 1999.

Design Systems Coordinator

I was born and raised in New York, but both my parents were born in Guyana, a plurality Asian country on the Caribbean coast of South America nestled between the ocean and the Amazon rainforest. After the end of slavery in the British Empire, many plantation owners in the Caribbean and South America looked for a new cheap form of labor. To fill this need, the British started a system of indentured servitude, through which they would bring Asian workers to the New World to work the plantations for a few years in order to pay for their journey. Though some signed these contracts freely, many others were manipulated, intimidated or kidnapped in order to fill the demand for labor. Upon arrival, my ancestors were forced to work hard labor in the sugar cane fields, and many never actually saw freedom ever again.

My family has been living in South America since the early 1800s and to us it is more of a home than any place in Asia, yet we still carry on our traditions and culture from our ancestors though now with a Caribbean flair.